Thanks to my little guest post over on John Cow’s site, my ReviewU queue is around five times larger than it was before. I guess people love free exposure. Anyway, it’s time to get working on them, so I figured I’d start with a site I’m already mildly familiar with: Fat Man Unleashed.

You may have heard of the blog’s author, Israel, before. He likes to troll John Chow from time to time, and was even perma-banned from John Cow’s site awhile back. He’s somewhat of a B-list blogging celebrity, in terms of name recognition. That’s why I thought it was pretty cool that he asked little ol’ me to review his site. Well, as much as I hate to admit it, I really like it. I hope that this doesn’t become a reoccurring theme (being positive, that is).

Not much in common

First of all, I have nearly nothing in common with this guy. I’m a 6′2″, 155 pound guy with a runner’s build. Israel’s 6′1″ and somewhere around 300 pounds, according to his weight loss chart. I can’t seem to put on much muscle mass, believe me, I’ve tried. He seems to be ready and able. I prefer cardio, he seems to do a lot of lifting.

On the other hand, we both like working out, and we both like seeing improvements. He’s kept a photo log of his bodily transformation, and I used to do the same thing. No, you’ll never see it. If anything, I went from skinny and pale to toned and slightly less pale. Also, I like his food and supplement advice. As someone who has tried at least three different brands of protein powder, a whole plethora of multivitamins, and assorted other supplements, I can appreciate some honest reviews of different bodybuilding products.

Overall, if you like to read about ways to go from fat to muscular, you’ll probably like his site.

On to the $$$

As you know, one of my requirements to be eligible for a ReviewU review is that you need to be monetizing your site. Well, it’s not hard to see that he’s doing that. I’m seeing Yahoo ads and affiliate ads a’plenty, but they’re not intrusive. You guys could actually learn something from him: Niche sites are great for affiliate marketing. These ads are the very definition of well-placed: Diet programs, healthy eating, and workout eBooks. It looks a lot easier to monetize a workout blog than a make money online blog.

The only ad that doesn’t really feel right is this one. Celebridiot? I agree, most celebrities are idiots, but that ad doesn’t really fit the theme of the site.

Overall, it looks like he’s taking advantage of his available space without abusing it, and has monetized his blog pretty well.

Nuts and bolts

The layout of the site is very effective, with a good color scheme and clearly-defined content areas. The text is easy to read, the eyes are drawn to the ads, and overall, it works very well.

Let’s see, the widgets. He’s got the Feeburner widget up, and it’s reporting…1,455 subscribers. Ok, that satisfies my ‘greater than 50′ rule. He’s also using the Entrecard widget, but it’s waaaaay at the bottom-right of the page and easy to miss. Not a big deal though, I’m pretty sure his site gets along just fine without Entrecard taking center stage.

I’ve never really understood why people put content in their footers. Sure, it’s extra space, but it’s easy to miss. Again, not a big deal, as the only things down there are the top commentators, the Mybloglog widget, a short bio, links to an Amazon store, and a legal disclaimer. In an age where you can get sued if a burglar injures himself while robbing your house, it’s always a good idea to have a legal disclaimer.

The bottom line

Original content and personal experiences, combined with a good site layout and lack of intrusive ads makes for a good site. If you’re at all interested in workout or dieting tips, I’d recommend checking it out.